Are You Miserable? Social Media Might be the Cause

A study recently conducted at the University of Copenhagen suggest that “lurking” on social media for long periods of time can make you envious, and thus make you more miserable.

“Too much Facebook browsing at Christmas, and seeing all those ‘perfect’ families and holiday photos is more likely to make you miserable than festive.”

The study was conducted with more than 1,000 participants. Most of the participants were women. According to the study, excessive use of social networking platforms, such as Facebook can have ill-effects on your satisfaction with life and your emotional health in general.

The researchers call it “deterioration of mood” which is caused by “unreal social comparisons” that occur after spending hours looking at other people’s joyful pictures and stories all over your screen.

The researchers suggested that users of all social media platforms to spend more time actively contacting people instead of lurking for hours looking on other people’s posts to avoid getting depressed and anxious.

Published in the journal Cyberpsychology, Behaviour and Social Networking, the study says that engaging with people in conversations more often instead of lurking is a much more positive experience.

“This seems to be much less gloomy than ‘passive’ users who spend too long ‘lurking’ on social networking websites without getting involved.”

Another suggestion by the researchers was to stop using all social media platforms for at least a week or two, which we all know very well is absolutely impossible for anyone these days.